{"id":23441,"date":"2018-03-21T17:46:56","date_gmt":"2018-03-21T21:46:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.runkevinrun.com\/?p=23441"},"modified":"2018-03-21T17:46:56","modified_gmt":"2018-03-21T21:46:56","slug":"march-21-2018-chili-pepper-series-day-1-las-cruces-nm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/?p=23441","title":{"rendered":"March 21, 2018 – Chili Pepper Series Day 1 – Las Cruces, NM"},"content":{"rendered":"

I first came to Las Cruces, NM, in October of 2014.\u00a0 At that time, Clint and Hanne Burleson put on a Day of the Dead series of races, the “day” stretching into a full week of running.\u00a0 They\u2019ve since sold their Mainly Marathons<\/a> business to two great brothers who carry on the multi-day events around the country\u2026 but Hanne and Clint have kept their New Mexico events under the banner of Dead Running<\/a>… and they are expanding to offer a few other themed races throughout the year.\u00a0 2018 sees the inaugural Chili Pepper series, a four day event that is using the same loop-de-loop course I remember so well from back in the day.<\/p>\n

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So here I am back at La Llorona Park, running 12 loops each day to hit 26.2 miles.\u00a0 It\u2019s a path that runs parallel to the Rio Grande\u2026 and atypically for this part of New Mexico, there\u2019s actually water in the riverbed at the moment.\u00a0 Usually it\u2019s a dry gulch of dirt and sand in these parts.\u00a0 So that\u2019s a unique treat.<\/p>\n

Returning to running, I\u2019m relieved to say that my back and ribs hurt about the same as when I wasn\u2019t running\u2026 so there\u2019s just a dull, throbbing discomfort but not a stabbing pain or anything.\u00a0 A friend of mine who knew I was hurting asked what I was at on a scale of 1 to 10.\u00a0 I shrugged and said a 3.\u00a0 I think that\u2019s fair.<\/p>\n

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What was especially tough today though were my legs.\u00a0 And maybe “tough” isn\u2019t the right phrasing.\u00a0 What was especially wobbly today were my legs.\u00a0 They got used to propping themselves up on an ottoman or coffee table as I lounged about on the couch.\u00a0 They therefore weren’t really \u201cmileage ready\u201d to log 26.2 today\u2026 and so we\u2019ll see how they do with 52.4, 78.6, 104.8 or the bonus Bataan Memorial Death March Marathon I\u2019m doing on Sunday.\u00a0 Ask me how the legs are after the five day total of 131 miles.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, today\u2019s results were 3:35:12.\u00a0 It was chilly at the start, somewhere in the high 40s but minimal wind.\u00a0 I had a throwaway sweatshirt that I kept meaning to toss after each loop\u2026 but each time as I made the turnaround I seemed to be hit in the face with a burst of wind.\u00a0 And so each time I thought to myself, \u201cwell, next loop for sure I\u2019ll toss this shirt\u2026\u201d\u00a0 And without fail each time I\u2019d hit the black cone marking the turnaround, the unofficial mascot of Clint and Hanne\u2019s races, and I\u2019d be hit with that same wind tunnel effect for the 1.1 miles back and think, \u201cwell, next loop for sure\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

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After 12 loops, and 26.2+ miles, I finally doffed the shirt for a photo along the Rio Grande.<\/p>\n

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***<\/p>\n

Las Cruces is also home to the World\u2019s Largest Chili Pepper, a roadside attraction outside a local motel.\u00a0 I was there in 2014\u2026<\/p>\n

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…and I went there again in 2018.<\/p>\n

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I first came to Las Cruces, NM, in October of 2014.\u00a0 At that time, Clint and Hanne Burleson put on a Day of the Dead series of races, the “day” stretching into a full week of running.\u00a0 They\u2019ve since sold their Mainly Marathons business to two great brothers who carry on the multi-day events around […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23441\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}